20 Steps To Self Employment

As the rate and speed of lay offs continues, I’m meeting more and more people who are looking to leave the corporate world to become freelance consultants or start up their own businesses in another area completely. 

Whilst there are fewer jobs across the economy, there are far more problems to be solved. Problems which create opportunities for new businesses.

How do you get started? 

Suppose you have a desire to become a freelance consultant or have a great business idea, how do you actually get started - and what are the key steps you need to take?

Here’s a simple 20 step slide show published by BusinessWeek on how to move from the corporate world into self employment. 

What’s missing?

Having made the leap into self employment after the last financial services downturn in 2003, I can see some of these points are very relevant. But I do think there are some key steps missing from this list. For one, there’s the importance of finding a new peer group.

Step 21. Find a new peer group

Finding a new peer group and community of self employed people (ideally within the same industry) is, in my experience, one of the biggest success factors for a start up. Being self employed can be a very lonely place to be. You need a peer group to share your highs and lows with, people to exchange ideas, resources and best practices with. Without it, you’ll struggle.

There are plenty of self employed people following this blog, so tell me – what do you think is missing from this slide show?

By Sital Ruparelia, Cross posted on the 6 Figure Career Management blog

Comments

[charlie]

Thanks for sharing this Sital

I started out in consulting 4 years ago and was lost in the 'fog' for such a long time. A step by step guide would have been helpful. I also wish I knew about the importance of finding a peer group - it's been the single biggest lesson I share with new consultants. My ideas, motivation and new clients come via my peers - so good point

What's missing?

Number 22. Make time to rest and play
- It's so easy to let the business take over your life. Making time to rest and have fun makes your business more successful

[billiesucher]

Sital, thanks for writing a post about this subject...I, like you, have been speaking with clients who are thinking about starting a business or going the self-employment route. What's also interesting is that I have been speaking with more self-employed people who want to return to a more traditional employer/employee role given the current market conditions. In any event, I would add Number 23 and Number 24 to the mix:

Number 23. You will need the unconditional support of your partner / spouse throughout the good, the bad, the ugly of owning your own business. To see if you're ready to jump in, take this little quiz:

http://www.score.org/cgi/quiz.cgi?quiz=internet_ready_be_own_boss_quiz

Number 24. Tap into outstanding resources already in place to help you succeed in your business; here are three:

* United States Small Business Administration

http://www.sba.gov/

* SCORE
http://www.score.org/starting_your_business.html

* Small Business Development Centers

http://www.sba.gov/news/index.html

[Malcolm Chlan]

I think that is going to start being a growing trend. With so many people out of work they really won't have a choice but to try to drum up their own business. I think we are going to see not a baby boom but a business boom of start ups.

[Sital]

@Charlie thank you for the comments and the further point

@Billie thanks for the additional point along with the excellent resources

@Malcolm - Thanks - I agree. But in fact, I think to some extent, we're all self employed - even though you may have a permanent contract OF employment - nothing is permanent. Going forward, we will all move from job to job (client to client) offering our services.

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